earth science

Lunar sample displays

Lunar sample displays is a earth science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Lunar sample displays rather than just read about it. In short: The lunar sample displays are two commemorative plaques consisting of small fragments of Moon specimen brought back by the astronauts of the Apollo 11 and Apollo 17 lunar missions. The plaques and Moon rocks were given as goodwill gifts in 1970 and 1973 to the people of 135 countries, the 50 states of the United States and some of its overseas territories, by United States President Richard Nixon.

Key takeaways

Lunar sample displays belongs to earth science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Lunar sample displays to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Lunar sample displays from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The lunar sample displays are two commemorative plaques consisting of small fragments of Moon specimen brought back by the astronauts of the Apollo 11 and Apollo 17 lunar missions. The plaques and Moon rocks were given as goodwill gifts in 1970 and 1973 to the people of 135 countries, the 50 states of the United States and some of its overseas territories, by United States President Richard Nixon.

Description

Apollo 11

The Apollo 11 lunar sample display is a commemorative podium style plaque display consisting of four rice-size dust particle specimens (dubbed "Moon rocks"), the recipient's flag and two small metal plates attached with descriptive messages. In 1970, US president Richard Nixon gave presentation samples of Moon rock gathered by NASA astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong, which had been flown from the Moon in the Apollo 11 lunar module Eagle and brought to Earth in the Apollo 11 command module Columbia, as gifts to 135 countries and 50 US states.

Apollo 17

The Apollo 17 lunar sample display consists of a Moon rock fragment from a lava Moon stone identified as lunar basalt 70017, the recipient's flag and two small metal plates attached with descriptive messages, all inside a wooden commemorative plaque. Near the end of their third and final moonwalk, and what would be the last moonwalk of the Apollo program, Apollo 17 astronauts Eugene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt "picked up a very significant rock, typical of what we have here in the valley of Taurus-Littrow... composed of many fragments, of many sizes, and many shapes, probably from all parts of the Moon, perhaps billions of years old" and made a special dedication to the young people of Earth. This rock was later labeled sample 70017. Nixon ordered the distribution of fragments of the rock to 135 foreign heads of state and the 50 U.S. states. These gifts were distributed in 1973.

Recipients Inside the United States, displays were given to all 50 states and four territories: American Samoa, Guam, Northern Mariana Islands and Puerto Rico. Outside the United States, the following countries received displays: Afghanistan, Albania, Algeria, Andorra, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Barbados, Belgium, Bhutan, Bolivia, Botswana, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burma, Burundi, Cameroon, Canada, Cambodia, Central African Republic, Ceylon (current Sri Lanka), Chad, Chile, China, Colombia, Congo (Brazzaville), Congo (Kinshasa), Costa Rica, Cuba, Cyprus, Czechoslovakia, Dahomey, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini, Ethiopia, Finland, France, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Greece, Guatemala, Guinea, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Jamaica, Japan, Jordan, Kenya, Kuwait, Laos, Lebanon, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Madagascar, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Mali, Malta, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mexico, Monaco, Mongolia, Morocco, Muscat and Oman, Nauru, Nepal, Netherlands, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Norway, Pakistan, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Rwanda, San Marino, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Somalia, South Africa, South Korea, Southern Yemen, Soviet Union, Spain, Sudan, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Taiwan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom, Upper Volta (current Burkina Faso), Uruguay, Vatican City, Venezuela, South Vietnam, West Germany, Western Samoa, Yemen, Yugoslavia and Zambia. Also, displays were given to the United Nations. Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Fiji, Solomon Islands (in that time a British overseas possession), Mozambique (in that time an overseas province of Portugal), Qatar, Tonga and United Arab Emirates didn't receive display of Apollo 11, but they received display of Apollo 17.

Stolen and missing

Of the 270 Moon rocks given to countries by the Nixon administration, approximately 159 are missing. Many that are not have been locked away in storage for decades. Their locations have been sought or tracked by researchers and hobbyists because of their rarity and the difficulty of obtaining more. They have also been stolen and forged.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Lunar sample displays

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Lunar sample displays claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In earth science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Lunar sample displays before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Lunar sample displays ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Lunar sample displays

In research: Lunar sample displays appears in earth science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Lunar sample displays in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Lunar sample displays is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Apollo program lunar sample displays, Diplomatic gifts, Petrology, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Lunar sample displays outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Lunar sample displays in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Lunar sample displays means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Lunar sample displays out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Lunar sample displays in simple terms?

Why does Lunar sample displays matter?

Because it connects several earth science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Lunar sample displays?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Lunar sample displays.